General science thread

The Science learned from the visit to Ceres, the dwarf planet in the asteroid belt, the only one in fact, is finally coming to my attention [perhaps I was not up to date]*. Astronomers are flabbergasted again.

Again, we find that there is water out there. I get the impression that we have gone from thinking, about twenty years ago, that there would be very little water in the solar system except for comets, to expecting now that water is all over the place, on our moon, on Mercury, common even on asteroids. So by now no great surprise that there is water on Ceres, plenty of it evidently, but not only is there water it is liquid water! That was a shock it seems.

I think the reason scientists thought there would be little water except for outer zones is because it rapidly dispenses when the sun's light hits it , as can be seen when a comet approaches. Why they didn't realize that water would find plenty of hiding places from the light on most objects just shows there is nothing more essential than actual facts and observations. I even think there was an assumption that water would undergo sublimation even if not struck by light; however, there is no reason for it to go anywhere, still being stuck to an object by gravity. Shameful not to realize that, but I am ready to believe it. I could be wrong, on the other hand what exactly were they thinking then?

I was watching 'How the Universe Works' and the statements that were made about this were astounding. Several of the commentators said that they still have no explanation as to why there would be liquid water on Ceres. They actually said that it would seem to require the generation of heat but that Science has zero, zilch, nada as to how heat would be produced on Ceres, confident that the core is quite dead. They threw out there the expectation the water would be saltwater, but were clearly saying that can't be the only reason there is liquid water. Wow.

Additionally, as I remember:

Ceres should not be in the asteroid belt; it appears to have been dragged there from the Keiper belt, probably by Jupiter, which is now believed to have wandered out and in during its existence.

There is a very large solitary volcano on Ceres, produced by water; but if there is such a thing, there should be more than one. They theorize the things get so soggy they puddle out to nothing over time.

Amazing stuff.

*I remember the news that 'Dawn' was approaching Ceres. That this was in 2015 is incredible to me. I could swear that was no earlier an event than sometime in 2017. I'm definitely losing it.

I wish you science geeks could solve the Pons-Fleischman Cold Fusion stuff. I think their original anomaly was caused by that security guard plugging the experiment into the electrical grid for a brief moment and that he did it maliciously but I'm not sure. I sure would like to see that Muon catalyzed hydrolysis perfected and more work done on that virus stabilized hydrolysis.

Much of the recent work in astrophysics and astronomy seems to have been the result of accidents.

I was so bothered by Dawn's timeline and the 2015 dates that I had to figure this out!

Dawn is still orbiting Ceres and still gets in the news, and going for the close-up on the bright spots was a 2017 event which I mistook for first approach. It still has power though that is not expected to last much longer.

check it out, from wikipedia page. That volcano that is shown is 3 miles high.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/2b/Video-FlightOverDwarfPlanetCeres-20160129.WebM/Video-FlightOverDwarfPlanetCeres-20160129.WebM.360p.webm

Quote: Fleastiff

Much of the recent work in astrophysics and astronomy seems to have been the result of accidents.

Welp, not the only field

Quote:

"Despite thousands and thousands of years of hurricanes, storms, erosion and rising sea level, the continental shelf can contain deposits with organic material," said Ryan Duggins, with the Florida Division of Historic Resources. "I think that’s going be the ripple effect (in the science community)."

Duggins said he and others had assumed there weren't any preserved sites in the Gulf of Mexico because it has a sandy bottom and sand does not preserve organic material very long.

"I was always kind of told that a site like this wouldn’t exist in the Gulf of Mexico, that it wouldn’t be able to survive," Duggins said. "Just out of sheer luck, a citizen brought this information to our attention and it’s been a great experience."

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/rare-7000-year-old-burial-site-discovered-in-gulf-of-mexico-off-florida-coast/ar-BBJIp5i?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp

Quote: rxwine

Welp, not the only field



https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/rare-7000-year-old-burial-site-discovered-in-gulf-of-mexico-off-florida-coast/ar-BBJIp5i?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp

Gee I didn't know that the man made sea level rise started 7000 years ago. Them old Florida Canjuns must have burnt a lot of coal and oil.

Quote: kenarman

Gee I didn't know that the man made sea level rise started 7000 years ago. Them old Florida Canjuns must have burnt a lot of coal and oil.

Quote:

During deglaciation between about 19,000 and 8,000 calendar years ago, sea level rose at extremely high rates as the result of the rapid melting of the British-Irish Sea, Fennoscandian, Laurentide, Barents-Kara, Patagonian, Innuitian ice sheets and parts of the Antarctic ice sheet.

8000 years puts it right in the time frame of this site.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise

An experiment to try to measure light from the very first stars may have detected a dark matter signature.

It's complicated, because the first ever light source in the universe cannot be seen. But their light output can be measured in radio waves (I don't understand the explanation exactly). Frankly I don't recall the explanation I read yesterday very well, so I won't try to repeat it. But the notion implies dark matter can, and does, interact with at least light, or can affect it.

UNLV scientist. Not often you hear that in the news.

Quote:

A UNLV scientist has discovered the first direct evidence that fluid water pockets may exist as far as 500 miles deep into the Earth’s mantle.
Groundbreaking research by UNLV geoscientist Oliver Tschauner and colleagues found diamonds pushed up from the Earth’s interior had traces of unique crystallized water called Ice-VII.

This new type of ice is about 1.5 times as dense as the ice we’re familiar with, which is called Ice I. It has an entirely different atomic composition, and it is similar to what is found on ice moons that would orbit planets like Jupiter or Saturn. Ice VII has an entirely different structure than Ice I, with a cubic structure rather than a hexagonal one.

While it is possible to create Ice VII on Earth with enough pressure, scientists did not think it could be found on Earth because it is too warm to even form Ice VII, and even more unlikely that it could be stable.
T
Of course, as it often goes with discoveries, this one was found by accident, explained Tschauner.
“We were looking for carbon dioxide,” he said. “We’re still looking for it, actually.”

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/03/180309170700.htm